


Holofernes

by Woehubbub



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Art, Blood, Gen, Hannibal Lecter - Freeform, Hannibal POV, Hannibal sketching things, No sex sorry I don't ship them, Will Graham - Freeform, kinda because who knows what that psycho is thinking, kinda bromance but not really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-09
Updated: 2013-09-09
Packaged: 2017-12-26 01:40:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/960082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woehubbub/pseuds/Woehubbub
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hannibal's greatest creation is Will's metamorphosis. From a nervous wreck constantly fighting and fearful of his own mind, he turns into something so beautiful Hannibal immortalizes in a sketch.</p><p>Aka the fic in which Hannibal gets what he wants, Will does things and then enjoys sketching it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holofernes

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my beta because without her this would be a mess!

He opened his pocket sketchbook, rolled the perfectly sharpened pencil between his fingers, and traced the first line of the building that he’d been starting at for long enough to memorize every mismatched log, every stain on the dirty windows, every patch of growing moss on the wood, and the fresh trail cleared of leaves from the backdoor of the house to the entrance of the cabin. Line after line, the modest cabin was reborn on the paper as a shrine to his latest masterpiece—the only true witness of an event so rare only those who mastered the art of transmutation witnessed it more than once in a lifetime.

A loud, pained scream pierced the silence like the solitary, powerful note at the end of the of a carefully crafted masterpiece. Hannibal closed his eyes to listen to and to savor the culminating silence—the ending of a symphony so beautiful it brought tears to his eyes. It was never the entire piece that hit the deepest cord of his complex and nearly dead heart; it had always been the silence after a masterpiece that moved him and that never failed to send a shiver up from his spine to his chest where a flood of emotions would overwhelm him.

He had created something beautiful—something he could lock in a cage and stare from outside to witness for countless hours in silence. He’d broken what was already broken—completely useless—then had put it together again, giving it a new meaning and purpose in life. Will saved stray dogs, giving them a home, letting them into his world full of sadness, nightmares and empty rooms. Hannibal handpicked rarities of nature, groomed them, exploited their potential and preserved them in a shrine. In a way, there was no difference between the two of them; they were trying to cure solitude with abandoned creatures, one through love, the other through dedication.

A second male scream started the second symphony—the one he’d craved to hear for months in which he had patiently and carefully constructed a perfected Will, his Will. A perfect companion and trophy who he could show the world, which would label him insane and would limit him with its rules, but who, with a single word from Hannibal, could be freed from all those chains and be reinvented. It was only when that scream turned into a cry for help that he closed his sketchbook, without rush put it inside his pocket along with the pencil, and slowly walked to the cabin where he knew he would find something sublime.

His steps were slow and careful not to scare the currently wild beast upstairs; he knew better than to upset someone after a painful metamorphosis. He had lived it himself decades ago after all, and the body count was something nothing he was proud of. A desperate scream and a loud thud were the green light that allowed him to rush his steps and face the sublime scene in front of him. 

There she was, in her full young and naked glory: a marble goddess impaled on the same antlers her friend had been, red dripping down every wound revealing the mortality of someone so painfully beautiful. Hannibal sighed and walked forward, ignoring the artist for a moment and careful not to step on the slowly growing pond of blood. With his gloved hands, he fixed her hair and the position of her head; he cleaned the crimson staining the whitened bones that held her up on the wall. He took a step back to admire it better, not muttering a word, not yet. Will had to go through that alone—had to experience the pain of having taken the life of someone he had convinced himself loved and cared for—to embrace the killer inside. With the same calmness, Hannibal dragged a stool from the corner, opened his sketchbook, and started a new drawing. 

No long after he started drawing, Will crawled to the body, soaking his hands and knees on the still warm blood to get closer to her, and then, in the most honest gesture Hannibal had ever seen from him, he hugged her legs and rested his forehead on the hollow between her calves to pray to his new saint, his personal martyr and virgin. 

“Is this what you wanted?” Will’s voice lacked the life it once possessed but had gained a peace he had never had. “Is this what you wanted me to do?” Hannibal ignored the question and hurried to finish the sketch; he would perfect it back home once Will was locked away and once he had the time to choose the right music to accompany the moment. “Talk to me! Tell me if this is what you wanted from me!”

“No.” He answered in an emotionless voice, denying him a consoling glance or a warm word. “This is what you wanted. This is who you wanted to be.”

“I loved her; I cared about her; I never... I never wanted to do this. She told me about you. She told me what you did; she told me what you are!” Will’s voice raised to a shout, but in his line of work that was nothing new to Hannibal. His meals screamed begging for mercy; his patients shouted at him asking for answers.

“And what am I, Will?” He looked up to capture another detail from the dead body: that drop of blood that dripped from the hole that punctured her heart.

“You’re a monster. You’re... you’re not human.” Hannibal nodded, looked at him for the first time since he entered the lodge, but looked away an instant later to continue with his sketch.

“Have you heard about Wendigos, Will?” He paused to correct the light on one of the horns, wondering if a better lighting would capture the moment better. When no answer came, he knew the answer. “Wendigos are demonic creatures, greedy cannibalistic spirits who kill and consume people. Their gluttony is so large that the more they eat, the hungrier they get.” Never losing his temper or the elegance of his gestures, he put the sketchbook back to focus entirely on Will. “They can never be full, and they won’t stop until they are forced to by someone more powerful than them.” He stood up from his stool and squatted next to Will, making sure that he would never stain his over-expensive suit. “For a while. I thought you were the one who were going to stop me. You were so close to capturing me and exposing my good work, and I couldn’t let you do that.”

“You... you’ve been feeding us human flesh. You... all that time, did you?” Hannibal nodded, and Will rolled to his side to empty his mostly empty stomach, ruining the coppery smell of blood and death with the stench of bile. 

“You are my friend, Will, but I couldn’t let you turn me in. That is why I had to transform you, to turn you into an ally and companion.” Will vomited again, but Hannibal remained unmoved. He’d smelled worse during his hunts; despite popular belief a dead human reeked of more than simple blood. “The FBI will track you down, they will find you and backtrack many of my own murders to you. You are me in their eyes; you are the copycat killer, the Chesapeak Ripper.”

“I can prove it’s you! I can prove I’m innocent! I just need time and--” Hannibal’s movements were faster than Will’s slowed reflexes. A needle pierced through his skin and a burning warmth spread through his neck up to his brain and down his spine. His vision became blurry and his body went limp. He was falling down the pit he’d avoided for weeks, and Hannibal was his only leverage. The doctor caught him in the air as his body went limp, then placed him down gently on the floor before stepping back to admire the new scene. 

Will was the fallen guardian uselessly lying by the feet of the one he betrayed. His design. His Abigail. 

Hannibal sighed, content, returned to his seat, and continued drawing her, adding now the new element on the picture. If his calculations were right, he had twenty minutes to finish the drawing, ten to go downstairs and meticulously create a crime scene in which he was not involved but also a victim of Will’s dementia, and five more to breathe some fresh air before the FBI arrived. He looked at his watch, took out his sketchbook, and waited.

Thirty six minutes later there was a loud bang on the door, the sound of sirens and shouting, of trained dogs barking and the loud motors of SWAT team trucks. He shook his head and sighed. They were one minute late for their appointment, and he did not appreciate that type of rudeness. Nevertheless, he limped down the stairs and hurried to open the door to the cabinet. Hannibal nodded to Jack. Jack didn’t get in the cabin; instead, he moved away to let him out and looked up to the sky.

“I was too late. I wanted to stop him but it was too late.” The mourning in his voice, the teary eyes and shaking hands made that statement more convincing than any lie should be. “I’m sorry, Jack. I did everything I could.” Jack put a hand on his shoulder and looked at Hannibal, straight into his eyes.

“Now I understand there was no hope for him, Dr. Lecter. You did everything you could with him. Unfortunately some people are born broken.” Hannibal nodded and put his hand over Jack’s, fighting back the disgust physical contact gave him. “But at least he had you. You gave him a chance to change but he rejected it.”

Hannibal nodded to Jack, patted his hand and limped to the ambulance parked by the spot he used to draw. He sat on the edge and watched how the scenery had changed. Its beauty had been spoiled by Will’s self-righteousness. The wind blew, ripping off leaves from the trees nearby and picking them up the ground. Some of them kept flying through the wind, some others got stuck on people at the crime scene instead of flowing as they did no more than an hour before. If only Will had done things differently. 

When he was asked something he didn’t listen to or care about, Hannibal answered to the paramedic who bandaged his cut hand. Will emerged from the door of the cabin laid down on a stretcher, hands and ankles tied for safety and a vial loaded with sedatives attached to his forearm. They carried him like would a coffin at a funeral, which in a way it was. And there was beauty in it. Hannibal smiled again; he was glad he had destroyed that cabin, that girl, and that lost lamb the way he had—the way he did with everything so broken, spoiled and shallow that reminded him of himself.

**Author's Note:**

> So why the title? Here's why.
> 
> The account of the beheading of Holofernes by Judith is given in the deuterocanonical book of Judith. In the story, Judith, a beautiful widow, is able to enter the tent of Holofernes because of his desire for her. Holofernes was an Assyrian general who was about to destroy Judith's home, the city of Bethulia, though the story is emphatic that no "defilement" takes place. Overcome with drink, he passes out and is decapitated by Judith; his head is taken away in a basket.
> 
> You guess who is who.


End file.
